Our Beautiful Traditional Brick House With Black Windows Remodel

I think purchasing the windows was technically one of the first things we did after moving into our new home, but it took about 6 months for the windows to get delivered. We didn’t end up getting windows installed until late August, but updating our traditional brick house with black windows was always part of the plan. 

Making the decision to upgrade our windows from the traditional white or cream to black so scary for many reasons, but making when you’re working with a brick front it can become especially intimidating. Here are the steps we took to make our decision:

First, we took off all the shutters, because frankly we’re just not shutter people. It’s amazing how different the house can look with such a simple change. With a few more easy changes we could take this house from colonial to modern classic.

Turns out, I’m actually afraid of heights. I learned this very quickly on my way up the ladder and I don’t know if this is something that I’ve developed, because I don’t remember it being the case when I was younger. But very quickly Kevin became in charge of taking off all the second floor shutters. However, I was an awesome ladder assistant. The shutters were made of plastic and were simply nail right into the brick. Since the shutters were so old and sun stained, some of them snapped during removal. We were not planning to keep them so this was fine for us, but if you plan to reuse your shutters, I recommend researching a safer way to remove them.

Now I should say that I’ve been in love with the look of brick with black trim for years, but it can be tricky to pull of depending on your brick type or house style. When we bought a brick house with such a classic flat front, I knew right away that we’d be able to pull off such a bold. It was only a matter of time until we moved forward with completely upgrading this  

Traditional Brick House with BLACK WINDOWS.

When we started doing our research it was very intimidating. There were a lot of fears going with black because you typically have 2 options and both have pros and cons:
1. Black Steel
Pros: Stunningly beautiful – the steel look has that classic old world look that really brings an element of glamour to a house
Cons: Its very expensive, you’re limited in how/if you can open the windows, and you can’t typically put screens on them so they won’t protect against bugs
2. Black Vinyl
Pros: Much less expensive, windows can open, you can add screens
Cons: Still more expensive than white windows and the black will eventually fade from the sun (after 10+ years)

Ultimately, we opted for the vinyl once we learned that vinyl is paintable which made us less worried about the fading issue. Worst case scenario, we can repaint in ten plus years – that’s not the WORST THING. Because the black windows were more expensive, we opted to do white vinyl on the back of the house where we didn’t need the drama.

The second floor came in much earlier than that bottom ones, but that was mainly because we ordered them at separate times. I had this dream of blowing out the bottom windows and making giant windows across the front of the house. 

When we were quoted $15k for that project (just for the mason and structural work), we decided to just go with the window layout that is already there. Because we were waiting on the quote for the masonry work, the lower windows did not go into the first order and were placed separately a little bit later. Soooo our house looked like a hot mess for a while.

Now that the bottom windows are done, we absolutely love it. It’s a totally different vibe than the rest of the neighborhood. To finish off the look, we painted the front door and garage to give the whole house a more updated look.

Another important thing to consider is roof color. When we moved into our house, the roof was a reddish brown color that would not have gone with the modernness of the black window trim. Lucky for us, the roof was original and needed to be replaced which meant we could go with a darker, black roof that would help tie everything together. I would strongly recommend considering your roof while making your window decision. 

Black planters help anchor the space and adds a bit of cohesiveness. What do you think? Would you make the bold choice to go black on your windows?